#AskTheCommittee: Clare Whalley, Meta4 Coaching
In this week's Sutton Coldfield news bulletin, we launch a new feature in which members of the Sutton Chamber committee answer your questions about their experiences in business. First up is business coach and Chamber vice president CLARE WHALLEY.
What is the one burning question most clients ask you and how do you answer?
How do I make more money, doing less?
After all this is the reason most people set up their own business - to run their own diaries and to have more money in the bank.
The best way to do this is to create systems and processes for everything you do in your business. Sounds time consuming, but it actually wins you back heaps of time in the medium term and means you can step away from the tasks in your business you dislike or aren 't very good at to focus on business growth or a passion project.
What's the one piece of advice you would give your clients to help them GROW their business?
Be clear on your why and what? Why do you want to grow and what are you aiming to achieve? All too often business owners are so busy in the doing and delivering to clients they lose sight of what they are actually doing it for? To spend more time with the family, to create enough wealth to invest in or help others. Get clear on these reasons and you 'll find you will be much more focused, time efficient and fulfilled.
At the Chamber's core is Connect, Support and Grow. How have these values helped your business grow in the last 12 months?
Seeing the Chamber navigate the pandemic positively impacted how I continue to run my business. By giving more help, guidance and support to those businesses who need it the most through sharing my expertise on webinars, at roundtables and so on. Plus, the opening up of more online networking events means I have attended national and international meetings being able to connect with people I wouldn 't have been able to before. This all meant my business and those business owners we work with experienced growth in what was a very challenging year.
Brexit and Covid has influenced our businesses in many ways. What steps have you taken that have created the most positive impact for your business?
Invested in coaching and training. In challenging times, it can feel like an easy decision to pull any training and development budgets. This is the one investment that should always be at the top of the list to remain in place! Investing in you and your team means you stay ahead of the competition, keep motivated and inspired to achieve more and always be innovating and keeping yourself working with like-minded, ambitious, and positive people. Working alongside a business coach has to be the biggest step that reaped the most positive impact in 2019/21 for Meta4.
Which businessperson most inspires you and why?
Holly Tucker and Sophie Cornish, the women behind Not on the High St. They had an idea to fill a gap in the market. They started with 100 retailers and relied on family funding to keep the business afloat. Grafting hard along the way they 've turned it into an incredibly successful business and made tens of their retailers million-pound businesses too!
Become more acquainted with our committee here.